Places to run out of gas.

General Questions
#1

Here is a reason Dougie wants to know his mpg precisely.Keeping this strictly to US and state highways and not ‘the baaaaad part of town at night’ ,where do you NOT want to run out of gas. There is a highway from Alpine,Texas north a hundred miles or more to interstate 10. It is straight as an arrow over flat as a griddle land. You can see for miles in all directions. There are mountains awayyyyyyy off on the horizons.At least the peaks the bases are below the horizon. There is nothing but desert, no ranch,no house, no sign of humanity. I drove it once(for ever) and did not meet or see one car behind or front the whole trip. Finally we came to a small rise,“What the heck is that way up ahead?” I most had a heart attack when a car appeared just as we both reached the crest.It was a Highway patolman,and he was just turning around to get back on the interstate at the bottom of the rise. “Look at ALL the cars!!” Musta been a dozen of them in plain sight. No gas station or any thing at the intersection. More endless miles north till Guadalupe Natl. Park. The sight of all that peoplelessness was great, but I was glad I had a new can of Coleman fuel.If we ran out of gas I could take that can of gas and cook something to eat for the next few days till some one showed up.

“…”-Marx

#2

Worst place – Walt Whitman Bridge (Philly/South Jersey Rt. 76 east)
When – Following a trouncing of the Eagles by the Giants.
I’ll never need a thesaurus for the word “idiot” again.

#3

Are you saying that for some unknown reason, a dozen cars had all run out of gasoline at the same place? Was the patrolman on his way to get some gas for those stranded motorists? I don’t get the point of this story.

#4

I can’t think of a place where I WOULD like to run out of gas… perhaps in front of a gas station?

#5

Been there, done that! Coasted into a gas station just as the engine coughed its last cough. If you have to run out of gas that’s the way to do it.

Now if only I’d had any money…

#6

In Crystal City, VA (just south of the Pentagon), I was always asked to spare a dollar to some poor sap that was headed to Maryland when he ran out of gas. It was at the same corner, and they were always headed to Maryland. Funny, though. I once offered to go get the gas can out of my car and give them the 2.5 gallons in it. They never accepted.

#7

How about:
A freeway, especially the “carpool”/HOV lane, any time of day.
Any suburban street, in the pouring rain. More so if you don’t know the area well and you don’t know where the nearest gas station is.
Any dangerous urban area after dark, especially on a Friday or Saturday night in the summer.
Any of the above, on a legal holiday.

#8

mr john wrote:

If you had a can of Coleman fuel, you could also pour it in your gas tank and run off of it. Campstove fuel – also known as “white gas” – is pretty much unleaded gasoline without additives.

I’m not flying fast, just orbiting low.

#9

Tracer,uh,yeah,I know.

#10

We’re getting away from the O.P. He didn’t mean running out of gas, say, in the south Bronx at 2:00 AM. He meant, I presume, where in the continental U.S. is the most godforsaken 400-miles-from-anywhere stretch of highway you could have the misfortune to run out of gas or break down on? Some stretch of desert where the State Patrol might find you five or six days later?

#11

A touch to the brim of the Stetson to you,lumpy. But I don’t own this thread. (oooooweeee, Did I ever git jumped on by some one for having the audacity to crack wise on HIS thread)I am sure Alaska has some great places to break down so lets just assume they win. Keeves I was trying to be ironic.The sudden sight of so many cars but at the same time being so few for an interstate. let me guess you’ve never been very far from a population center. I grew up in the Texas panhandle so I know what a fur piece down the road is.And I have seen lonesome country. But for a highway,this was the furest fur and lonesomest lonesome I ever seen. Chief had the opposite problem,my sympathies.

“…”-Marx

#12

If you had a can of Coleman fuel, you could also pour it in your gas tank and run off of it. Campstove fuel – also known as “white gas” – is pretty much unleaded gasoline without additives.

No way. Coleman fuel has a way lower flashpoint than gasoline. It has more in common with lighter fluid.

Do not put this in your car as a substitute for gasoline.

The term ‘white gas’ used to refer to highly refined kerosine. Way different in flashpoint and burning qualities, than Coleman fuel.

Don’t do it.

#13

I did think of one place. It’s the 70 interstate between Green River and Salina (we call it Saliva) and there are a bunch of signs warning you that it’s 105 miles or so to the next station. It would really suck to be stuck out there in the summer. Let’s see I think it’s like 110 during the day. In the shade. Bummer!

#14

Downtown Detroit on a Friday night after everyone goes home after the Tiger’s game. Freaked me out. BAaaaaaaad place to be, man.
or:

Downtown LA near the Greyhound bus station (sorry, don’t know if there’s more than one.) I had to wait there for a trip once at about 11:00 at night. Creepy. Glad I’d taken a taxi down and didn’t have to find a parking spot. Actually, now that I think about it, I can’t remember WHY I was at the bus station: where was I going? What was I doing? Okay, now it’s freaking me out! Had something to do with the airport, I know that. Oh, I remember!! I flew into LA and took the Greyhound to San Diego. (Don’t ask me why I didn’t fly into San Diego: I don’t know that either :stuck_out_tongue: )

#15

Byzantine:

I think I’ve driven there…Utah, right?

That’s pretty desolate, all right. But there’s a stretch of federal highway (US 152, possibly? I don’t recall for sure) between El Paso, TX and White’s City, NM (just outside of Carlsbad Caverns National Park) where there’s absolutely nothing. Of course, people do use the road quite a bit, so I guess you can get help from someone if you break down. So your Utah stretch is probably worse.

Chaim Mattis Keller
ckeller@schicktech.com

“Sherlock Holmes once said that once you have eliminated the
impossible, whatever remains, however improbable, must be
the answer. I, however, do not like to eliminate the impossible.
The impossible often has a kind of integrity to it that the merely improbable lacks.”
– Douglas Adams’s Dirk Gently, Holistic Detective

#16

Ahh, Utah. My favorite place to get stuck.

My ex and I were once trying to get from Boulder, UT over to Hwy 95. We were on a camping trip, and our Gazzeteer showed many dirt roads going over the Henry Mountains. “Great!” we thought “We can do some exploring.”

Talk about a place to get stuck. We took a wrong turn down a very muddy road, and we couldn’t get back up. Spent 5 hours trying. Finally sat down and looked at the map. According to the map, there was a large ranch about 10 miles away. We had passed several of these ranches on the way up, and they all were right where the map said they were. We talked for a while, and thought about the fact that if we just spent the night where we were (we had camping gear) the mud would probably freeze and we could drive out in the morning. But why do that when there was a ranch 10 miles away, and we had our mountain bikes?

We got on the bikes, and for safety my ex decided to take the tent and sleeping bags. We started biking, and after a mile or so came upon more mud. Mud so bad we couldn’t bike. We pushed our bikes another couple miles, then it started to get dark. We decided to set up camp. I got off my bike and promptly started to get hypothermic as all my clothes were wet from sweat. Luckily, hubby was OK and threw me in the tent while he made some hot tea.

When we woke in the morning, it was so cold in the tent our water bottles had frozen solid. We got up and used rocks to chip away grapefruit sized frozen mud balls that had built up on our brake levers. Finally, we biked all the way down to the highway. Once the sun came up it was rather nice, but man were we hungry & thirsty.

Some people stopped on the highway and gave us a ride to the nearest town - Hanksville. There’s one tow truck operator in Hanksville. His name is Carl. We quickly found out around town that he’s known for gouging tourists stuck in the mountains. But, we had no choice - the next town was 100 miles away. So, we talked to Carl, who told us he’d go up the next morning and get our truck. He and my hubby got up early and drove up there. My hubby thought it was odd he didn’t bring a tow truck. When they found the truck, it was still early morning. Carl told my husband to start up the truck and drive it out of the frozen mud. He did, and it worked.

The final bill? $500. For a ride to the truck. Carl didn’t even get out of his truck.

If any of you are ever in Hanksville, I encourage you to throw your garbage at any tow trucks you see. They’ll be Carl’s no doubt about that. He’s got a good business there in Hanksville.

#17

Oops, I forgot to mention, the Ranch we were shooting for had closed 20 years before. Carl was very forthcoming with this information.

#18

mr john wrote

Bingo! Give that man a stuffed animal!

Spent almost my whole life in northeastern New Jersey. The closest I’ve ever been to driving through no-mans-land was probably some stretch of I-95 between here and Miami. Maybe the Savanna-Jacksonville piece.

I look at a map, and think of some of those roads in Utah and Nevada, and I just get terrified. How do you people do it!

#19

In the isolated subcategory: the highway leading towards Big Bend National Park, in August –
http://www.mapblast.com/mblast/map.mb?CT=29.310757%3A-104.1524%3A10000000&GAD1=&GAD2=&GAD3=Taos%2C+NM&GAD4=USA&W=425&H=250&IC=29.310757%3A-104.1524%3A8%3A&Zip=79846&lv=9&MA=3&zoom. x=18&zoom.y=61

For worst place to run out of gas for other reasons, I nominate the middle of New York City’s midtown tunnel.

Designated Optional Signature at Bottom of Post

#20

Keeves, you point the front of the car,sorry, pickup, at the little pinpoint of the highway on the horizon,pedal to the metal, pop atop, lean back and hold the sterring whell steady with your knees.(look out when the lines of the road start converging,they’ll scratch your paint)

Ahunter, that’s it as it so happens,we were leaving Big Bend,it was July though, 6 people in a honda civic,no air.
Cm, yep you got it too,the northern partany way, from I10, LOTS of traffic on that stretch, oh man when we got up into the Guadeloupes and felt that refreshing 90* breeze.
Bug,I HAVE used coleman in a car in a pinch,she’ll buck like a snake bit mule but she’ll run.Coleman is NOT lighter fluid or kerosine,don’t EVER put those in a coleman stove.White gasis NOT kerosine,never was http://www.m-w.com/cgi-bin/dictionary?book=Dictionary&va=white+gas Kerosene is akin to diesel. My grand mother had a kerosene cook stove out at the homeplace in West Texas since it was a fur piece out there.The new colemans can use Unleaded from the station,just be sure to pour it through a filter.

“…”-Marx